Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For April, we’re looking at a heartwarming new women’s fiction book with a side order of ghosts; a heartfelt story about a fictional child star; a pair of dual-timeline Christian romances; historical fiction set in early 20th century Oxford; an anthology of short stories about Jane Austen’s supporting characters; mysteries set in places as far-flung as Mississippi, Wisconsin, and Iceland; an unusual new fantasy; an audiobook about a fictional band; and nonfiction about Amy Semple McPherson and the Kuehn family.
If you like women’s fiction:
Pamela Terry’s Through an Open Window (2025)
If you like your women’s fiction with a generous dollop of magical realism, try this latest book from Pamela Terry. Margaret, a new widow in Georgia, slowly attempts to move forward with her life, with the encouragement of the ghost of her aunt who raised her.
Recommended for those who enjoy the work of Viola Shipman.
Stephanie Burns’s Far from the A-List (2025)*
Michaela skyrocketed to fame as a child star, but navigating her life as an adult is anything but easy. In between trying to rebuild her career, battling with her manager mother, and rebuilding her disastrous love life, she has her work cut out for her. Try this if you like your women’s fiction intermingled with romance.
Recommended for those who enjoy Katherine Center and Ashley Winstead’s The Future Saints.
*Audiobook also available on Hoopla
If you love Christian fiction:
Karen Barnett’s Through Water and Stone (2025)**
Set amidst the backdrop of Zion National Park in Utah, this novel juxtaposes two different storylines–the tale of a grieving park ranger and his wife finding an abandoned child there in the 1940s and a modern tale of Talia, who returns home to the park and her grandparents following losing her job. She finds potential romance as well as family secrets after receiving shocking DNA test results.
**Ebook also available on Hoopla
Recommended for fans of Amanda Cox.
Amanda Cox’s The Bitter End Birding Society (2025)***
Ana Leigh returns home to Bitter End, Tennessee, to help her great aunt sell her home, but she gets more than she bargained for when she joins a friendly local bird watching group and gets engrossed in trying to mend a decades’ old family estrangement over a forbidden romance.
Recommended for fans of Lynn N. Austin.
***Audiobook also available on Hoopla
If you enjoy historical fiction:
A.D. Bell’s The Bookbinder’s Secret (2025)
In the early 20th century in Oxford, England, a young bookbinder apprentice named Lily uncovers a mystery through a letter in the book she’s working on. The letter talks of a secret romance and a treasure, and she finds herself visiting bookshops and libraries to find more clues. However, what starts as an intriguing puzzle quickly erupts into something else entirely as she realizes that dangerous people who will stop at nothing are also trying to solve the mystery. Complications ensue.
Recommended for fans of Jess Armstrong’s The Curse of Penryth Hall, Bridget Collins’s The Binding, and Peng Shepherd’s The Cartographers.
Ladies in Waiting: Jane Austen’s Unsung Characters (2025)
In this anthology of short stories, several popular authors, including Adriana Trigiani and Elinor Lippman, turn their writerly attentions to side characters in select Jane Austen novels. These characters range from the other Bennett sisters to poor Hetty Bates. Some of the stories function as prequels or sequels, while others imagine the characters in more modern settings.
Recommended for . . . you know who you are, Jane Austen fans. 😉
If you prefer contemporary mysteries:
Eli Cranor’s Mississippi Blue 42 (2025)****
Native Arkansan Cranor usually sets his noir here in the Natural State, but for his latest, he turns his attentions across the Mississippi River in this first book in a projected series. Rookie FBI agent Rae’s first assignment is to a white-collar crime investigation in a small football-obsessed town in Mississippi. Her dad was a professional coach, but nothing in her background prepares her for the star quarterback being murdered. Though it’s not her investigation, she cannot resist taking a look into what’s really happening.
Recommended for fans of S.A. Crosby, Amy Engel, and Clayton Lindemuth.
****Ebook also available on OverDrive and audiobook on Hoopla
Amy Pease’s Wildwood (2026)
I previewed the first book in this series a couple of years ago. I generally don’t then cover additional books in series, but both have garnered such excellent reviews I had to make an exception. In this latest entry, sheriff’s deputy Eli is doing better than he was. A veteran suffering from PTSD, he’s spent the past year rebuilding his life while working for his mom, the sheriff, in a rural Wisconsin county. But when they find an informant dead, the ensuing investigation may threaten everything Eli has worked toward.
Recommended for fans of William Kent Krueger.
Eliza Reid’s Death on the Island (2025)
If you prefer mysteries with a more international flair, give this one a try. Branded as Agatha Christie meets Nordic Noir, nine people gather for dinner on an isolated Icelandic island, but only eight of them survive the night. As a fierce storm traps them, one of the attendees–an ambassador’s wife–takes it upon herself to find the murderer in their midst.
Recommended for Agatha Christie fans.
If you want fantasy:
J.R. Dawson’s The Lighthouse at the Edge of the World (2025)
In this heartfelt fantasy, a waystation for the dead exists in Chicago. They find their way there due to its lighthouse before taking the ferry to their new home. Nera is the daughter of the ferryman who takes them across the water, and she knows the drill. That is, until the night the lighthouse dims and a living person arrives.
Recommended for fans of Stephanie Garber’s The Alchemy of Secrets and Madeleine Thien’s The Book of Records and T.J. Klune’s work.
If you need an audiobook:
Ashley Winstead’s The Future Saints (2026)
Following the death of their manager, the Future Saints’ luck has been nothing but downhill. Record executive Theo is tasked with stopping their nonproductive spiral and getting an album out of them. What he doesn’t count on is them changing up their sound, let alone falling in love with lead singer Jess himself, or getting caught in the middle of an explosive relationship between Jess and her sister, who’s also in the band.
Recommended for fans of Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Daisy Jones & the Six.
If you like nonfiction:
Claire Hoffman’s Sister, Sinner: The Miraculous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Aimee Semple McPherson (2025)
Aimee Semple McPherson was one of the leading evangelists of the 1920s and 1930s. I remember first hearing about her in a literature class because she inspired a character in Sinclair Lewis’s Elmer Gantry, but what I didn’t know until this book was released is that she disappeared for weeks during the height of her fame. She reappeared, claiming she had been kidnapped, which just fueled further interest in her. This biography dives into the complicated life and times of McPherson. Thanks so much to Julie for purchasing this book and the next one at my request.
Recommended for fans of Jeff Guinn.
Christine Kuehn’s Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal, and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor (2025)
Christine Kuehn never knew anything was particularly unusual about her family until a screenwriter called and asked her about the Nazi spies–yes, plural–in her family tree. She was startled, but her father reluctantly confirmed the truth of the rumor. Kuehn herself then started to unwind the complicated story of her aunt and grandparents, who, after running afoul of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, were assigned to Hawaii and passed secrets to the Japanese about Pearl Harbor.
Recommended for fans of Philippe Sands and Ben Macintyre.
What’s your favorite new-ish books? What books are you buzzing about for 2026? Have you read any of these books? Tell us in the comments! As always, please follow this link to our online library catalog for more information on any of these items or to place them on hold.
Berryville Book Buzz 